Unclean
by Bassair
Summary: Ward can't get clean and Skye thinks she knows why. (Spoilers for 1x15 "Yes Men")


This was inspired by thoughts of "wow this show didn't handle this at ALL" while watching the episode, and helped along by ineedaradio at tumblr's post (post/79428805534/oops-i-keep-bringing-up-things-about-last-nights) - which is well worth reading - and assorted sundry posts.

(Also, a note to those who read Undercover Lovers (feel free to skip right on to the fic if you don't): At the moment updates are halted due to being juggled between laptops that aren't mine, inability to get to my music collection and inability to get to my S.H.I.E.L.D. episode for research purposes. It's making life difficult to write one-shots and impossible to write long commitment fics. I was going to get a chapter out at least weekly, and then my desktop died and I'm left floundering in a world of stress and unhappiness. There _will _be more. I will write more. I just need my PC back first.)

* * *

It'd been days since his will, his logic, his reason had been taken from him. _Days_ since Lorelai had stolen the one thing he'd always fought to keep: his self-control and right to _choose_ .

Ward had always been the one that said _no_. When all the other lemmings were throwing themselves off the cliff, he'd stood his ground, refused to follow. It had taken him years to learn that talent, years to get a grip so tight on it that no one could worm it out of his grasp. No one took that anymore, not even S.H.I.E.L.D. He made his own choices now.

And she'd taken that.

It'd been days - nine long days - since Lorelai had gotten her hands on him and he still didn't feel clean. He stood in the shower for an hour every morning - fifty-three minutes longer than his schedule allowed - and scrubbed himself red-raw until his skin started to peel. His training said this was a psychological reaction, that he wasn't _actually_ dirty, that the grime on his skin was a projection of the way he felt inside, but it didn't help.

He still couldn't get clean.

He found himself crashed out on the sofa, one foot bracing his knee so he could rest his hand against it holding onto a Kindle to read from. He read a book a week but he was still stuck on last week's. His mind wouldn't focus.

He looked up as Skye sat down next to him, resting her laptop on her thighs and watching him. "Simmons let you out of prison, I see."

Her lips quirked in amusement. "With strict orders not to do anything too strenuous, so maybe I shouldn't be talking to you."

He wanted to laugh, he did, but all he found himself doing was making a weak noise and rolling his sleeve up, scratching at his skin.

When he looked back at her, she was looking at his arm. "I know I offered you this once before," she said, her voice getting softer, gentle and kind, "and you chose... other avenues to pursue, but... my shoulder is free." She touched him last time, her warm hand on his arm, but this time she doesn't reach out, a distance kept between them, and it confuses him. "Especially since things are different now between you two so this might... be more difficult."

He frowned at her, smiling a little in his befuddlement. She always confused him, not a day went by that she _didn't_ make him wonder if he was slowly losing his mind with her technobabble or slang, but this was something else and he was missing a big piece of the puzzle. "I don't understand what you're talking about."

Skye's brow furrowed just a little. "I just... it's not easy talking to your significant other about being sexually assaulted..."

"She's _not_ my significant other!" Grant spluttered, almost dropping his Kindle in shock. "We were just-" He broke off, his face losing its expression as her words finally just... _sunk in_.

"Grant...?" she coaxed, searching his face for emotion. "Ward..."

"I wasn't sexually assaulted," he said in honest confusion as he got a hold of himself, meeting her eyes. "I wanted it. She was attractive, how wouldn't I? I remember wanting it..."

She watched him for a moment. "Attraction doesn't mean you want it," she murmured, voice low and soothing. "And you weren't in your right mind. None of it was your fault or choice."

"I..." His mind was reeling because now all the pieces of the puzzle of how _dirty_ he felt made sense. He'd thought it was the feeling of a cheater - something he'd never, ever been - or the feeling of having his control taken away, and it was... but it was more than that too. It was the feeling of being a victim, _again_, but this time in a way he'd never been before. "It was my fault," he said, looking up at her, an all-but-visible shield coming up in his eyes. "I was the one in control and we still did it."

"You were drugged," Skye said. "Drugged doesn't equal consent and it definitely doesn't make _any_ of it your fault. I heard about May hitting you, that... it was wrong, too, Ward."

He got to his feet and she followed, but her movements were slow, like she was scared of spooking him. "This isn't like that," he said. "I lost control. I'm sorry, I've apologised, that's... the end of it." He turned his back, taking long strides away, away from Skye and away from this conversation.

"So when I was drugged," she called after him and he paused. "When he slipped something into my drink and I got _so high_ I didn't know up from down or my boyfriend from the man in front of me, when his face was attractive but I would have said no in any other circumstances had I been in my right mind... I should be apologising for that too?"

He turned slowly, his eyes locking on hers. "No."

"No?" she said, taking some steps in his direction. "Why?"

"Because you didn't... your mind was altered by the..." He'd been so comfortable in denial, hadn't he? "Skye. I'm sorry that happened to you."

"It didn't." She watched him, her dark eyes never leaving his. "It happened to my friend and I saved her. And what her boyfriend said, after she told him about making out with this stranger who took advantage of her, was that _he_ was sorry. He ached, it made him hurt, but he wasn't angry, he wasn't _mad at her_. It wasn't _her fault_, it was her assailant's. Tell me it was her fault, or tell me it wasn't, but either way you're saying the same of yourself."

He swallowed hard. "I started it." It was a weak, desperate confession as he grabbed at what was left of his control. It was _him_. _He'd _done it, chosen it, taken that control and made it his. "I started it, I kissed her, I wanted it..."

"Would you have wanted it if you hadn't've been controlled?" Skye reached out for him, slow so he could retreat but he didn't. Her hand brushed his arm and it hurt, but he didn't know if it was real or if he was imagining it. He didn't shy away. "Would you have kissed her if you hadn't been tricked into thinking you were in love with her? That she was a goddess?"

He was silent for the longest time, his eyes locked on hers as he searched desperately for an out, some way of keeping it his fault, because if it was his fault... if it was his fault he could apologise, let May hit him again, let _Skye_ hit him if it helped, Coulson for betraying them, Fitz for bringing her here, Simmons for getting Fitz hurt. He couldn't find one.

"No." The word was barely audible, dissipating into the air like smoke in the wind. "No, I wouldn't."

Skye brushed her hand down his arm as the smallest of tremors went through him. "Ward," she said. "My shoulder's free."

He swallowed hard and then pulled away. "I'm going to bed," he said. "I'll... see you tomorrow." He turned around and this time Skye let him go, knowing the conversation was over, knowing he was done.

He got into bed, lay down and closed his eyes. All he could see was Lorelai's face, unpleasant and just... _there_.

Worse still, his bed was empty. He'd never done it on the plane with May, no, but it was a metaphor. She wasn't here anymore because... because Lorelai had made him do something he wouldn't have done otherwise.

He rolled onto his side and watched out of the window, quietly adding this onto the list of things he wished he could forget.


End file.
